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Members of a Berwick-based group aren't messin' with sasquatch when they venture into the woods at night, but members do hope to run into the elusive, towering hairy creature.

The Pennsylvania Sasquatch Association, which formed in January, hopes to find proof that the sasquatch, better known as Bigfoot, exist.

"We believe they exist," said Bob Bucko, an association member and investigator. "There are more than 400 years of reports and 70 years of photo evidence of finding tracks and castings of tracks."

Pennsylvania ranks 10th in the 50 states for sasquatch sightings - possibly because of its large tracts of unpopulated lands and dense woodlands, he said.

"People don't think that Pennsylvania is that dense, but it is," Bucko said.

The often 7-foot-tall, 650-pound sasquatch stick to wilderness areas and shy away from people - having been known to throw rocks or branches to scare humans away, he said.

"When seeing humans they usually will just watch us from a distance, if they feel nonthreatened by our presence," Bucko said. "People shouldn't fear them. There are very few reports of aggressive behavior toward humans."

Still, the team has been spooked on investigations in the woods, he said.

This summer, the team went into state game lands in Sullivan County and stopped for a break as they headed out of the forest, he said. Founding member Steve Shultz was showing the team a phone app for sasquatch calls, and then shut down the application and was taking a photo with his phone, when they heard "a loud, high pitched scream mimicking the one app call," Bucko said.

"It sent chills through the four of us investigating that night," he said. "It was on over 50,000 acres of dense woods, so we believe no one was around."

They went back two weeks later and looked in a different area, he said. They heard something large making sounds in the brush and then it took off through the woods, and the group members saw trees moving in its wake, he said.

"We ran into that area, which was dense with ferns, but saw nothing," Bucko said. "Also in the Berwick area, we did an investigation in the Jonestown area and had something rather large walking parallel to us farther down the mountain in the dense brush for a short period of time."

Team members don't believe every noise in the woods is a sasquatch, he said, and encourage people to keep an open mind.

"We talk to nonbelievers, as well as believers," Bucko said.

More than 25,000 people liked the association's Facebook page and nearly 11,000 follow the fledgling group on Twitter, he said. Their webpage has been viewed 100,000 times, and nearly 700,000 people have watched their "Sasquatch Diaries" videos on YouTube.

"We have a mix of believers, nonbelievers and skeptics on our Facebook page," Bucko said. "But we welcome all our fans' opinions on the subject. I am sure we have many people who just like or stop by our page out of curiosity."

The group also gets leads on sightings through Facebook and the website, pasasquatchassociation.com, Buck said. He encouraged people to share their sasquatch experiences with them either through a private message on Facebook, or through the contact tab on the website. "We keep all information confidential," he said. "Even if it was years ago, we can at least add it to our sightings database."

The team follows up on reported sightings and also investigates areas they feel could sustain a sasquatch, Bucko said.

Usually a team of four with video cameras and audio recorders trek into the woods at sunset, looking for evidence, such as footprints or branches broken high off the ground, he said. The sasquatch is believed to be nocturnal, but they have been spotted during the day, he said.

So far, the only evidence they found is that haunting scream from the investigation in Sullivan County, Bucko said. But the team hopes to get into the woods this winter, when there is snow on the ground, he said.

The association is now nine members strong, Bucko said, and members have varying backgrounds and employment, including education, anthropology, biology, law enforcement and firefighting. Many are outdoorsmen, or enjoy the outdoors.

Founders Mike Bobersky and Shultz have been interested in the paranormal and cryptozoology for years, and conducted their own investigations before formalizing the group in January, Bucko said.

One member came face-to-face with a sasquatch outside his childhood home in Ohio when he was 9, sparking a lifelong interest, he said.

"Most members have always been interested in the whole sasquatch 'myth,'" Bucko said.

kmonitz@standardspeaker.com

570-455-3636

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